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Dysfunctional & close to collapse

By Karl R. Keys, Esq.

The California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice today issued its long awaited report on the state of California’s deth penalty.  It found California’s administration of the death penalty is “dysfunctional” and “close to collapse.” Among the panel’s findings: * After sentences of death, cases are automatically appealed to the California Supreme Court, which upholds the sentence 90% of the time, compared with an approval rate of 73.7% in 14 other death penalty states from 1992 to 2002. Since 1978, 70% of the cases upheld by the state and then appealed to federal courts have been overturned. * A 1978 voter initiative that helped make 87% of first-degree murders subject to the death penalty dramatically increased the number of death sentences in the state...continue to full post

Full post as published by Capital Defense Weekly on June 30, 2008 (boomark / email).